buying a tikkun

[cellio]

Tonight I went to Pinsker's in search of a "tikkun", the book that gives all the torah portions with trope and division into parts. (I don't know why this is called a tikkun.) This turned out to be more challenging than I had anticipated.

[Geeking follows.]

I've heard lots of things about "Kestenbaum" (I guess that's the editor), so I looked at that one first. It's large, has English translation, and costs $60. It's also physically very heavy. I don't need English translations, and the English introduction didn't say anything new to me (near as I could tell), so I kept looking.

There was one that was entirely Hebrew (including what looked like an introduction). It didn't make the boundaries between parshiyot obvious, and I had to do some digging to find the markings between aliyot within a parsha. Fine if you know the text well; not so good if you need those guideposts, like I do.

There was another all-Hebrew one that had very small print; I didn't examine it closely.

This left the one published by Ktav. (I think that means "book". Well, same root, anyway.) It has clear headers at the beginning of each parsha and each aliya, and it shows the weekday aliya breakdowns as well. I can't tell if it gives you what you need to handle double portions; I looked at Matot-Masei (the one we're doing for that service at the end of July) and there's something at the right point for the end of the first (combined) aliya, but I can't make it out and the book does not contain an introduction explaining notation.

This book had a familiar look to it, though. Upon closer inspection, I realized that this is what David has given me photocopies from on a couple occasions. It seems to be sound, and I know I've been able to work from it in the past. And it was $20, which is a far cry from Kestenbaum.

None, not even Kestenbaum, had Hebrew that was large enough that could read without mechanical assistance. That's disappointing, but I guess I shouldn't be surprised.

I opted for the familiar-looking, inexpensive Ktav. And this Shabbat, I will begin learning Matot-Masei in earnest.

Comments

[estherchaya.livejournal.com]

I'm surprised the Hebrew in the Kestenbaum wasn't large enough for you to read. It's the largest I've seen, I think. I always photocopied parshot out of it anyway, which would have allowed for enlarging, so that I could make notes on the page.

As I understand it, the advantage to the Kestenbaum isn't so much the translation, but the fact that the Hebrew text has fewer mistakes. It's a good idea when learning any parsha to check the text against multiple tikkunim, because there are sometimes discrepancies.

[cellio]

Mostly I could read it, but Hebrew has some fine details in script that I have trouble with -- the difference between vav and zayin, or between patach and tzere, in particular. It's the sort of thing that, in this book, I could get by staring at it for a while, but in reality I would just use a magnifier and read at normal pace instead. So I guess Kestenbaum is right on the border for my vision.

Of course, some of these problems diminish with proficiency, just as native speakers of English can parse compressed text and text with misspellings, both of which screw up people who aren't as proficient. I know some words well enough for the sanity check to carry me, but there's still lots of room for error. And the trope language is still pretty foreign to me; if I misread a symbol there I probably wouldn't notice.

It's a good idea when learning any parsha to check the text against multiple tikkunim, because there are sometimes discrepancies.

Thanks! I never would have thought of that, just as I assume that the text in a Chumash is accurate. (I mean the Hebrew, not the translation.)

I've been using this site as a secondary source; it's handy to have electronic copies that I can easily enlarge as needed. The site isn't printer-friendly, though, and I'm not good enough with tools to fix that, so I wanted a book.